W H HAT are the means of controlling and perpetuating a race relations pattern? What are the processes and techniques of social control as they operate to keep Negroes place? It was previously pointed that many of the obvious formal and institutionalized informal means of control have been extensively investigated in the South, in some large northern cities, and on a nationwide basis.' In the North we do not find for the most part the thinly veiled threat of violence against Negroes for getting out of place. On the contrary, legally they have equal status, and the spoken values of the dominant white population emphasize equality. Nevertheless, Negroes do stay places, and we must ask: what is their and what keeps them there? This study investigates these questions in a small New England town by means of a field study. One further note should be mentioned at this time. In any situation of separation between racial, religious, or nationality groups such as exists in the United States, there is a place for both the dominant and the subordinate group. The white has to learn as does the Negro, and controls operate in both cases. For purposes of simplification, however, this study has stressed the maintenance of the Negro's ''place. The concept of social control generally seems inadequate, at least in regard to the interracial situation, for most authorities in this specific field2 seem to have neglected two important aspects. In effect, they define the white techniques for keeping the Negro his place, but they do not carry the concept of social control far enough. Two conceptual modifications of the theory of social control appear to be necessary. First, the theory assumes the influence of human agents but neglects the effect of such impersonal factors as different cultural and regional backgrounds, different behavior patterns, differences in living conditions and relative numbers, and so forth. Secondly, while the theory mentions the control a group exercises over its own members, it does so only in passing; the main emphasis seems to be on the controls emanating from the dominant group. The possibility of self-imposed control by the subordinate group is largely ignored. To be sure, some social psychologists have stressed the conditioning of the individual, but conditioning on a group basis has been largely overlooked. For purposes of this study, therefore, social control consists of the pressures exerted on groups or individuals by impersonal forces as well as by others or themselves, all of which make for conformity to the established rules and social norms. It is further the sum total of techniques, mechanisms, rules, sanctions, folkways, mores, and processes whereby a community or society